How to choose the right fashion accessories for women?

Choosing the right fashion accessories is always a difficult task; they can greatly enhance your look and if misused, can spoil it completely as well. Find out how to choose your right fashion accessories like jewelry, handbags, perfumes and footwear, depending on the dress, occasion and body types.

How to choose the right fashion accessories - all those scarves, belts, jewellery, ribbons, hair bands, handbags, perfumes and footwear - is often a mind boggling task for women. Never underestimate the power of right fashion accessories to enhance your overall appearance. For example, if you slip on a skilfully selected broach or scarf, even an ordinary outfit will look arrestingly beautiful. Choosing the right fashion accessories is also often a challenging thing, as slipshod accessories can turn even the most expensive and elegant garment into a sartorial disaster. Remember, you need to choose your fashion accessories depending on the occasion too, and not just the dress.

If you are wearing an elegant fawn-colored silk sari for an informal kitty party in the morning, a single string of pearls around your neck will team very effectively with it. Matching pearl ear studs and a tiny broach holding the sari pleats in place on the shoulder can be the other pieces of jewellery you can wear without hesitation. But if the occasion were a more formal one and in the evening, the same sari, if worn with an ornate gem-embedded choker around the neck, and matching gem-set bracelets on the wrists will look dramatic. Here are few expert tips to help you choose the right fashion accessories.

How to choose the right fashion jewelry?

Follow these simple thumb rules for choosing the right fashion jewelry. Put on sterling silver jewelry for daytime wear and reserve the more brilliantly flashy gold jewelry for evenings. Of course, this rule can be relaxed when the occasion or mood demands it. If the dress is heavily embroidered and ornate, keep the jewelry light and delicate. Otherwise, there is the risk of looking overloaded. Further, the beauty of the ensemble should be heightened and not overshadowed by the accessories.Similarly, the dainty look of a gossamer thin Chanderi or Benarasi cotton sari will be enhanced a hundredfold with heavy chunky ornaments which will provide a perfect contrast. But do bear in mind that if the sari has embroidered silver motifs, it needs silver ornaments to set off its beauty. Gold jewelry will clash in the overall effect. If you remember these simple steps to choose the right fashion jewelry, you are going to be the show stopper for sure!

Choosing the best handbags for your clothes and body type

Handbags are available in such a mind-boggling variety in shops that it is quite understandable that one feels bewildered. Always have a good stock of handbags to suit your clothes and the occasion. Basically, your collection should have handbags for both formal and informal occasions. Some should have straps to sling over the shoulder, and some should be clutch bags. Their styles too should vary from the neat, uncluttered ones to the ones with several pouches and pockets to hold essential articles.

Matching your handbag or purse with your dress is vital. Reserve glittering, stone-studded ones with shiny golden chains for formal, glitzy events. Take care too that the colors of the bag do not clash with those of your outfit. Handbags come in all kinds of materials, ranging from jute and leather to rexine and cane. Leather bags are a safe bet for both informal and formal use, for these spell class with a capital C. Ensure that these are clean and glossy. Discard bags which are frayed or which sport rents, however much you are attached to them.

A young mum will opt for capacious bags which can hold all the necessary items which her child will need — from an extra nappy to a lollypop. The collegian's dress will need a swinging bag from a shoulder to complement it. The nattier the better! Personalize your casual handbags with patches, curious buttons and broaches to advertise your identity.

Do not overstuff your handbag. This will make it look like a fat piggy. This is not only likely to cause to tear at the seams or loosen clasp but it will also look unattractive. The woman’s handbag which can accommodate the unlikeliest of things is often the butt of men’s jokes. The latter, rarely though, learn to appreciate the methodical madness with which the lady packs her handbag!

Did you know that your physique too plays a part in the choice of your handbag? If you are a small built person, avoid large ornate bags or huge ones slung over your shoulder because they will make you look like Santa Claus. By the same measure, do not carry a teeny-weeny purse in your hand if you are hefty and well- built.

Choosing the right footwear to match the occasion

It makes sense to also have a wide assortment of footwear to choose from when you are stepping out of the house. Broadly speaking, you should have footwear for formal evenings, for hardy wear, for sports, for walks and for home wear. Bedroom slippers, soft and fluffy, will make your night clothes look cosy and cuddly too. Always retain the shoe boxes and slip your footwear into them after use. Wipe them clean of any mud or grease sticking to them before putting them in the box. Leather sandals and chappals need regular polishing, and canvas walking shoes will look like new with a good wash in the washing machine once in a while.

Choose your footwear with discretion when you are dressing up. It should relate to the ensemble you are wearing and not clash with it inharmoniously. For instance, traditional Indian clothes like the sari and the salwar-kameez are best teamed with Kolhapuri chappals or sandals of traditional styles. Pencil-tipped stilettos with an ornate Benarasi sari will look incongruous. Reserve the stilettos for a Western style evening dress.

The casual jeans and blouse look will need canvas shoes on the feet and not Kholapuri sandals. Embroidered jootis will create the snooty nawabi style when worn with embroidered kurtas and churidars. It is best to avoid heavy-looking footwear if you are a petite, delicately- built person. Needless to add, if you are a tall and willowy, it is best to avoid footwear which will make you look like a giraffe in a sari.

Choosig the right perfume to match your personality and the occasion

Many of us do not realize that even perfume is a fashion accessory. Use flower and wood perfumes for daytime if you have to wear one. Office goers should avoid heavy scents and use subtle ones or simple eau-de-Colognes or fragrant talcum powders and deodorants to ward off body odor. It is most unbecoming for one to go to work smelling like a perfume factory.

For special evening dates and formal parties, it is quite in order to spray yourself with that special French perfume. Here too, if you are wearing traditional Indian garments, it will be very appropriate to opt for attars, sandal perfumes or gulab scents which will fit in perfectly with your appearance.

Did you know that perfumes smell differently on different persons? It has something to do with body chemistry! Always try out a new perfume before buying it. Dab a little on a pulse point like the wrist, wait for about half an hour, and then sniff! Does it smell good or has it changed? If it is still as fragrant as before, you can safely splurge on it.

The kind of personality you are should also be considered when choosing your right perfume accessory. An outdoor type will feel good in pine scents, flower aroma sprays and other woodsy scents which will complement her style. Perfumes are also known to be mood-makers. Some help us relax and soothe our nerves, some invigorate us. Some even make us feel depressed! So the choice of perfumes is as important as choosing our whole outfit.

Some golden rules for choosing the right fashion accessories

A collection of interesting clasps, brooches, buttons, medallions, buckles, clips, and pendants is the woman's best friend-in-need when she wishes to create a style for herself.

A simple, old dress can be transformed by a gorgeous brooch or clasp pinned on the shoulder. Use your ingenuity to add special little touches to your clothes with different accessories.

The choice of accessories is a very personal thing. It separates the lover of beauty and the creative person from the mundane one! Your personality, your mood of the moment, your build, and coloring and even occupation wilt all have a bearing on your accessories.

Never copy, as far as possible, although imitation is the highest form of praise! Be a trend-setter. Even it you fight shy of going off the beaten track, and wish to play safe, it pays to indulge in some experimentation when it comes to adding that little extra touch to your ensemble.

A tiny diamond pin in the lapel of your jacket, a special motif on your handbag - and voila! You are showing the world that you are beautifully different!

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